"Blacken the sky Can't stand to see the sun The truth of light Reveals the hatred that has won" – I Saw The End by Pallbearer

Monthly Archives: September 2015

Hailing from Portland,Oregon where there has been plenty of bands popping up like zits on the face of that nerdy kid that you picked on in school. Anyway, Oregon has been a breeding ground for metal lately, and Spacebeast is a part of that metal movement. Spacebeast encourages you to make up your own lyrics as the music goes along as they are a complete instrumental band. There are no lyrics here and that is just fine. The musicianship presented on this self titled effort is on point and ridiculously heavy. Spacebeast play some intergalactic doom, and the five songs here are more than able to suck the air right out of your space suit and your eyes right out of their sockets.

From the first note to the last, these Portland dwellers lay down the heavy which is jet fueled by heavy, murky riffs. What this group does really well is take you on a cosmic trip with a beast just like the one that is depicted on the album cover, but instead that beast is this release. I for one am glad to see a doom band that is instrumental, because a lot of the time doom and sludge acts can have the same vocal stylings that get used and dried up quickly.

Without using any of those vocal styles, Spacebeast cut all of that out of course and just focus on the task at hand which is to just create good music to listen to, and there is no shortage of good music to listen to here. Each of the songs played on this self titled effort never mimic or copy one another as the songs are unique in their own way, yet they all shred just the same.

Doom can be a long and drawn out genre, and that is just its nature. With these songs being relatively long, they never make your attention waver. There are no dull moments as this album keeps chugging along whether you are on board or not.

The guitars crunch and chug heavier than a lot of riffs and thrown into the elephant sized riffs is the occasional finger bursting guitar solo. Behind the riffs are the drums which rumble and pound their way through, and to compliment the drum work is the bass which gives each song a little more character and a little more of a rugged heavy vibe.

Overall, Spacebeast is exactly what the name implies. The tracks ladled here to shove down your gullets are in fact of beast proportions. They are memorable, catchy and headbang worthy and well worthy of a good listen or two.

I’m positive that you read Children’s Suicide Music and that turned you off because you began thinking of little kids committing suicide. And while Viranesir and the rest of the Merdumgiriz groups aren’t out to make friends, this album isn’t out to promote kids killing themselves in macabre fashions either. Merdumgiriz-which is the name of the label as well as the man behind the kit on this album-isn’t exactly shy about making people feel uncomfortable on that same token the label is not shy about making thought provoking music as well. As a matter of fact, Merdumgiriz’s catalogue has gotten the boot from Bandcamp, but that article will be for another time. For now we will focus on the music that is at hand.

And the music that is at hand comes from a band called Viranesir. As metal progresses and different genres form, and different bands take on different sounds, I’m not quite sure Viranesir conform to any genre changes, or conform to anything that is of the metal “norm”. Much like the other bands that fill the Merdumgiriz roster, this band is entirely unique and sits in a dark bleak room all on its own.

Not only does this not sound like any other band out there, this doesn’t sound like anything that I have ever come across. The band themselves took it upon themselves to label their music and it is the most accurate label anyone will ever come up with. The label in which they placed upon themselves is “blackened doom synth”. That description is spot on as the only real instrument played here are the drums. Everything else recorded on this album is synth and creepy singing.

Children’s Suicide Music is seven tracks of glacier slow doom metal (synth metal?) that really truly makes you believe that you’ve stumbled into the imagination of a deranged man. That deranged man happens to have very peculiar nightmares, the walls of his mind melt around you while you become sucked in by this odd dissonant music, and that odd dissonant music ends up being Viranesir and their album Children’s Suicide Music. There really is no other way to describe something like this believe me I’ve tried.

What you do end up hearing all throughout the album are interesting discordant sounds paired with the disturbingly slow doom synths. The vocals are something that only nightmares can conjure, as they are oddly mystifying and draw you in in a twisted sort of curiosity.

Interesting may be putting it entirely lightly as this album may take more than the average number of spins to completely comprehend. Digesting this piece would be the equivalent of trying to eat a whole live horse by yourself. There is an odd charm about it, something that draws you in. Maybe it is the fact that it is so foreign, or maybe it is the dark twisting world in which Viranesir create with their music. No matter which way you slice it, Children’s Suicide Music is a very intriguing statement indeed. One that needs multiple listens, one that needs a warped mind, and one that needs someone with an open mind to listen to. If you have that open mind and that adventurous side then Viransesir is exactly what you are looking for.

Death from down under is brought to you today by Brutonomy. In case you did not get my woeful pun, Brutonomy is from Melbourne, Australia and Brutonomy stay true to their name and come across as brutal as you would hope. With a name like Brutonomy there are certain brutal standards in which your music will be held, and as far as I’m concerned they check every box in the death metal check list. This check list is not a happy one by any standards unless you are a metal head. The checklist consists of items like disease, mental disorders, war, and enough gore to put Jason Voorhees to shame. If any of those items get your pickle dill, then Brutonomy is right up your filth covered alley.

If you like death metal at all, even just a little bit The Duality of Being is a perfect fit in your collection. Brutonomy mix old school death metal with the new to create a bludgeoning force of mutilating death metal. The four songs that are provided here “revolve around the polar opposites of the human condition” according to the band.

Within the first couple of minutes-or seconds even-of the opener The Duality of Being you can feel your head nodding back and forth to the rhythmic sounds of slaughtering music. Soon those nods turn into heavy neck twisting headbanging, and sooner or later you just won’t have a head.

During the course of this release you can tell these Aussies pay homage to the bands of old such as Suffocation, as well as work in their own flavor. They don’t recycle riffs, or rhythms, bass lines, nothing. Everything here has that fresh stench of death smell to it, like they have been fermenting cadavers for years in their basements.

Trying to escape the infectious metal would be entirely futile. While keeping that thrashing, concrete smashing sound, Brutonomy does a great job with keeping the music melodic as well. The songs are entirely memorable and catchy, and for death metal that is something that doesn’t happen all too often. All four of the songs here differ from each other as well never letting one sound the same as the one previous.

There is not a weak point during The Duality of Being; the entire release is solid as it is one big block made up of flesh and festering skin. Locking your house would be a wise choice while listening to this album because I’m sure that plenty of people were harmed in the making of it. And unless you want to be their next victim, then dead bolting that bad boy and loading your shotgun would be the best decision you’ve made all day.

With the twin guitar attack that saws through your neck and spine like it were a hot knife through butter coupled with the frenzied blasts of the drum, your face is bound to look like a pulpy mess after a couple of listens. Another component to the music that makes it even more thick and murky is the bass. Behind the ax wielding guitarists and the machine gun drumming, the bass lays down a thick bass line and even gets its time to shine in Finally Clean. Over top of the brain bursting musicianship, the throat shredding vocals take the form of a pissed off monster that has been hiding under your bed for years. The growls are subterranean, and paired up with the monstrous growls are some gravely screams as well.

Four songs does not seem like a whole lot to go off of, but with Brutonomy and The Duality of Being there is enough meat here to chew. The album as a whole moves in one destructive direction, and each element that is on display within these songs is executed very well. Not one thing overshadows another, the musicianship is great, the vocals are demonic, and any fan of death metal should want to have this on their shelf.

With the second installment of Monday Morning Mayhem, I bring to you four more bands that will help you fight the good fight against that asshole that everyone hates, and his name is Monday. This playlist will help you emerge victorious against that dreadful day. Enjoy and headbang the Monday away!

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The very first band to help you combat Monday is a band hailing from New York and they are called Sicada, and their EP is titled Requisition. Requisition unleashes six tracks of pure fiery metal upon its listeners. The combination of death metal and thrash make for a furious offering. The marriage between the two genres seems to be a good, bountiful and fulfilling one, as the songs that Sicada offer here are equal parts death metal and thrash. Each song brings fiery riffs, and acrobatic drumming to the table as well as the occasional shredding guitar solo. Sicada have a good amount of groove in their songs as well making Requisition balanced and not just about the visceral onslaught of metallic goodness. Sicada keeps a melodic edge while thrashing about creating a maelstrom of metal. Having that melodic touch is important because it gives Sicada that extra variable, that little extra something to have the listener think about while listening. Sicada nail this EP combing old school death metal elements with a harsh thrash attack that creates something that is fun to listen to and headbang to while making people air guitar and drum until their heart is content.

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Just because Monday’s aren’t depressing enough, I bring Arrant Saudade from the UK. The Peace of Solitude will be released October 1st but is available through Bandcamp currently. Arrant Saudade plays funeral doom in the most depressing sense of the word funeral. The music is glacier slow, and emanates music that is utterly depressing and dark. The riffs are slow and low, while the drumming is rhythmic and comes off as depressing as well. Who knew that drums could be so melancholy? Well it turns out that these drums can be and are very melancholy. The vocals presented here on The Peace of Solitude are incredibly deep and monstrous in delivery. The growls are deep and carried out slowly and powerfully, and backed by these possessed vocals are choir like vocals. Music is meant to make you feel a certain way, and Arrant Saudade really make you feel as if you are at a funeral, or just in a depressed state in general. As the hypnotic clean vocals run through your head, you end up feeling like you are haunted by ghosts of the past that are here to cross you over to the other side. Other than being completely bleak and disparaging, the music itself is beautifully composed, and sounds like death is whispering sweet nothings into your ear. Don’t resist your fate, succumb to the darkness as you feel death’s cold hand reaching out for yours.

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Staying in the UK we find Groak and their EP Masticator. Going from utterly depressing doom to a more accosting crust doom combo. The Masticator EP features four songs that are bleak and destructive. Each song has a filthy amount of fuzz to it which helps this band lay waste to anything that opposes it. The songs are quite long which means you get subjected to this skull rattling noise for quite a while. Your ear drums buzz, and your brain rattles and bounces off of your cranium at furious speeds because of all of the filthy buzz that is present here on Masticator. For the most part this EP is also glacier slow, and at certain points the music picks up to assault even further giving the EP some variation, but then it slows back down to its abrasive yet slow style. The vocals are screamed at you, shredding the throat of the vocalist. And I’m not quite certain how anyone could have stayed in the booth for very long recording any of these songs with the amount of bass that is injected into Masticator. If you truly feel like having your organs ruptured, Groak is probably your go to band.

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Traveling back across the pond we find Fornicus from Kentucky. No they don’t play banjos or bluegrass or anything of that sort. Instead they play some black metal. Feast For Rats is their EP which was just released this month. With the majority of bands on this list that will cast you down into the pit of despair, this band is no different. Except for their pit of despair happens to be lined with hell fire. Fornicus really is blasphemous because they are smack dab right in the middle of Bible Belt territory. So really in a sense that really qualifies them to be incredibly black metal. These heathens unleash three tracks of their devilish style of music. They add some symphonic bits to their music creating an even more sinister sound than they already posses. The riffs are sordid and positively evil, the drumming is a controlled chaos, and the vocals are dissonant as well as throat cutting. Each song spews a decent amount of venom which corrode your ear drums until you are completely deaf. A darkened fog can be seen drifting over Kentucky and the rest of the Bible Belt courtesy of Fornicus. Bible thumpers beware, Fornicus is coming after you.

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Hopefully the second installment of Monday Morning Mayhem will help you send Monday to hell! And Monday Morning Mayhem is brought to you by Satan, the heavy metal ambassador.

Imagine for a second what pure burning hatred sounds like. Then listen to Malicia by Tod Huetet Uebel. They sound pretty close to what hate would sound like if it were in fact a sound. Malicia translates to malice in English, and this record by these Portuguese black metallers has plenty of malice. Each song is raw and burns with blackened hell fire. Not only are they soul piercing, and punishingly fast, but Tod Huetet Uebel does a great job in creating a particular dark and startling atmosphere.

They create such an atmosphere not only with the music, but with unsettling screams that sound like a soul that has been damned to hell only to be tortured for the rest of eternity. They even mix in some spoken word elements as well which sound like incantations. And I’m not sure if the Devil himself helped with the recording of this album, but I have a strong feeling that he did, and with the help of the Devil he added his own evil twist to the music.

There are seven songs on this album, two surpassing seven minutes, one being exactly nine minutes long, another being eight, and the rest with the exception of the closing track are over five minutes. In total Malicia is forty-four minutes long. And within those minutes you get exposed to some pretty hateful and soul darkening black metal. The reason I mention the time is because unlike most black metal where the songs are two to three minutes long and offer nothing but blistering music to listen to, Tod Huetet Uebel offer so much more.

With the longer songs, Tod Huetet Uebel is able to create exactly what they want to create, and make you feel like that soul damned to hell only to be tortured for all eternity. Don’t get me wrong however, each song does offer that punishing blasting of blackened brutality as well, but they mix other elements into the music to make it not so one dimensional. And making songs one dimensional is exactly where a lot of bands go wrong. They make music that sounds evil enough, but they never add anything extra to take that extra step to really create such a spiteful and burning hatred feeling.

During the third track (all of the tracks don’t have names, just numbers) right in the middle, the song breaks to only have dissonant guitar work bounce around in your head and to have evil demonic laughter drive you to madness right before the music picks back up to blast away at what sanity you have left. A lot of the songs presented here to have that little break here and there in the music to keep you off your toes, and to create something all together sinister. Not everything has to be a punishing nail bomb of noise constantly, and Tod Huetet Uebel is not just a nail bomb. They’re a nail bomb that packs more punch because of the variety that they supply and because they are not just a one dimensional band.

Malicia feels structured to deliver one critical strike after another, and after the closing track the album loops back around again only to carpet bomb you seven more times. The riffs writhe and coil around your neck like a serpent, while the malicious drums attack and shred your morality. Meanwhile the atmosphere provided drives you into a despairing void of nothingness which soon morphs into a black cave of demons and pure unfiltered evil. The vocals are that of a tortured and tormented being, and they fit so well into what Tod Huetet Uebel is trying to portray.

Malicia is dissonant, accosting, and aggressive, all things that you want to hear from black metal. Through all of the hate and disdain, Tod Huetet Uebel supply that much needed and wanted atmosphere to their music, making everything that much more dark and chaotic.

If you are that tortured soul, or you just want to feel tortured Tod Huetet Uebel and Malicia is for you. If black metal is your thing as well then this is a must for your collection. Hell, if you love metal in general this is a must for any collection. It’s dark, cold, full of hate and spite, and Tod Huetet Uebel execute perfectly on everything here. Malicia will be out October 16th this year through Caverna Abismal Records.

If you had one guess as to what kind of music The Physicists play, and you guess black metal, I’d hit you with a goddamn shovel. The Physicists hail from Finland, and they have been around since 2006. According to the press release, this album took four years to create, and you can tell it did. The amount of focus and detail put into My Love Is Dead is apparent from the beginning. The Physicists are an industrial metal band, and this album contains ten tracks with three mixes of certain songs that appear on the album. Spending four years with something and putting all of your energy into it can make someone crazy. And I think that it did it to this band. The music presented here is schizophrenic to say the least.

The album is cohesive and melts together very well, but it jumps around a lot and there are sounds that don’t exactly mix with other sounds, but somehow The Physicists pull it off and make everything mesh together like one psychotic drug induced nightmare.

Metal being infused with industrial elements and even electronic elements is not something that is new to the world of metal, but here there is something new. Most industrial acts tend to sound like a Fear Factory clone, and for them their sound works well, and for others trying to imitate it, it sounds like shit. But here, The Physicists don’t sound like anyone but themselves.

Certain aspects of the industrial parts are reminiscent of Marilyn Manson, but those moments are brief and of course don’t last long. Everything here is fresh and original and the industrial parts don’t overshadow the metal that is present here as well.

During the course of the album, The Physicists do a good job of mixing creepy skin crawling tones with more light hearted sounds. And the creepier sounds bring you to a very dark place, one that you never knew existed even in the darkest recesses of your mind. Some of the music makes you feel as though you’ve been kidnapped, thrown into a van, held captive in a dark room somewhere with fluorescent flickering lights, and the only thing that you hear every day is the same pounding bass laden industrial noise.

Other than being held against your will, My Love Is Dead-as mentioned above-works together to work toward the goal of bringing you a solid piece of music. No particular thing detracts from the whole of the music. In fact everything works well together creating a unique interesting piece.

My Love Is Dead provides various and ever changing industrial elements as well as pounding, headbanging metal. You get a menagerie of sounds, that when stitched together tell an interesting story. The synths and other electronic sounds provide a great deal of atmosphere as well as chaos for the already chaotic music. And with that chaos combined with the pounding-and at points somersaulting drums-as well as the crunching rhythmic guitars you get something truly reality bending. You even get quite a bit of variety with the vocals. You get clean singing as well as more of a haunting spoken word performance, which both of those styles are accentuated by the occasional growl as well as a scream that could belong in a black metal album.

Each element here is executed flawlessly, and the music is orchestrated expertly as well. With so many different sounds flying around your head, it never becomes difficult to listen to. The Physicists worked on this album for many years and worked their main mixer to the point of suicide, and it shows here with their newest effort. The attention to detail is great, and at first you may not like it, but the album is a grower. You get the industrial parts, as well as the hard hitting heavy metal that you can bang your head to, and My Love Is Dead overall is a good and intriguing listen.

My Love Is Dead will be coming out October 2nd through Inverse Records this year.

The blob of a name that you see to the left of this sentence is a band that goes by the name of Nasmork. These gents and lady, hail from Germany and Symphonische Tanze is the name of their album. They play grind, and in typical grind fashion the songs on this album are not particularly long with the longest song clocking in at just under two minutes and the shortest being four seconds. There are eleven songs here, but if your mind were to wander for just a second you’d miss the entire thing.

Also in typical grind fashion, the music itself is chaotic and disorderly. Each song has a mission, but a long the way they may stop, fuck some stuff up elsewhere then carry on to their destination. There is plenty of whirlwind grind noise and screaming for any grind fan out there.

Through each song you get subjected to a different kind of noise as the songs start out relatively different, and a long the way you can hear differences in the music which is a good thing, because if there weren’t some differences then the whole album would sound like one long song.

From the opener though, all the way to the four second closer there is no break in the meat grinder that is the grind that Nasmork puts forth.

Putting their most grotesque-but best-foot forward, Nasmork shoot out of the gate at a blistering pace never to slow down or heed the warning that they may burst into flames if they play with such intensity.

The bombastic style of play comes from the simple fact that they are a grind band. But that isn’t the only reason why the band is explosive. You can play grind all you want, and you can have a lot of intensity, but you can sound like a train hitting a truck at full speed too. And you know what that would sound like. That’s right, a disaster. Now, Nasmork and Syphonische Tanze are far from perfect, but they seem to be on the right track.

With the hyper riffage that barrels straight into your chest, the somersaulting drums, the ever thick and meaty bass and the vocals that sound like the vocalist chewed up glass before the recording session, Symphonische Tanze is grind to its core. The vocalist, she even breaks out a couple of pig squeals at the end of the album to keep you on your toes. Is Symphonische Tanze perfect? The answer would be no. But for grind it seems to me that the more chaotic the better, and Nasmork supply the chaos and the noise in droves. As I said above, this fledgling grind band seem to be on the right track, and on their way to making more noise in the future. So, if grind is your filth covered cup of tea, Nasmork may just be the right fit for you.

It is no secret that there are some albums that take a little bit of digesting before really being able to soak it up. With Finnish band Electric Deathbeat that seems to be the case, not only with their album they released but as a whole they may take a little bit more time to understand, which is never a bad thing. Dead Echo Paranoia features eleven songs that combine industrial and electronic elements, as well as just straight up pounding heavy metal. The mix of these elements is a unique one. For the most part bands that use industrial or electronic elements or both for that matter don’t use them all of the time. For Electric Deathbeat, those synths are always there. They force you to listen to them as they dance whimsically around your head.

Each song supplies its fair share of industrial as well as heavy metal. The music is fairly well balanced, and as a matter of fact I can see Robo Cop beating the shit out of criminals to this. Robo Cop is not the point however. The point is that this particular and peculiar style of music could take a little bit of getting use to. Not only does this music make you want to head bang, it makes you want to sing a long to it, and it makes you want to break the glow sticks out and dance around in a dark room at times.

More often than not, Electric Deathbeat supply the heavy riffs and shotgun blasts of drums. Injected into that is the electronic elements, being whimsical at points as well as creating a certain skin crawling atmosphere at other times. And with that being said, Electric Deathbeat show off their diversity, not only in creating a very unique brand of music, but also in the way that they mix the synths to create something that can be paired with devastating riffs, as well as create something entirely on their own that can either be odd and creepy, as well as fun and light hearted at other times during the songs.

For me where the album really began picking up was at around the halfway point. Not that the first half was lacking, but the second half the band and their vision seemed to come together nicely. The mix of the metal and the dizzying synths seemed to mix together in harmony a little better.

During the second half of the album, the vocalist brings out a Mikael Akerfeldt-esque roar more often than he does at the beginning of the record. The singing itself is interesting, it is its own entity because there are a lot of different styles that are present within these eleven songs. You get some clean singing that has a prominent melancholy sound about them, and mixed with the cleans are more of a spoken word style that the vocalist uses the most. There are two more vocal styles that make appearances on Dead Echo Paranoia however. As mentioned above, there is a deep growl that makes appearances throughout the record-more so in the second half-and accompanied by the deep roar is almost a black metal like scream. For vocals it comes down to a lot of preference, and for me the growls and black metal-esque screams seem to work the best with this music.

Paired with the roars, cleans and the electronic sounds are the instruments that can be quite loud and pummeling at parts, as well as quiet and subdued at others when needed. There are riffs throughout that are heavy and hard rocking getting anyone to bang their head. Behind the guitars is a pretty acrobatic performance from the drummer which keeps up with both the synths as well as the riffs. And at the forefront of a lot of the music is the bass. It is very prominent and really makes itself known all throughout Dead Echo Paranoia.

Through an interesting mix of just about everything, these Finnish metal heads end up bringing Dead Echo Paranoia to your speakers. As stated above, this listen may take a little bit of digesting, and if at first you don’t understand, you will eventually. The album is good, it does make you bang your head, and at the same time it makes you want to throw a rave at times. Electric Deathbeat does mix the stylings of electronic and industrial music well with the more hard hitting metal tones. Dead Echo Paranoia is an interesting piece with a peculiar twist to it, and it does deserve and is worth a listen.

Earlier this month I was able to review In League With Satan’s debut self titled album and that review is here. And earlier this month I sent some questions their way, and they were kind enough to answer. So, I have for you today a featured interview with In League With Satan.

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In having such a unique sound, was it difficult to find a label to help you put your debut out?

Thanks for the nice word about our sounds. Our 1st release was a self production made by myself; at that time, for some personal reason, I’ve had the need to release a little piece of uncompromising black death metal. It’s too easy to disturb people not into extreme metal, I prefer to hit hard people into this subculture, in my opinion, to much mainstreamized.

With being an experimental black metal band, and with a couple of the songs from the record being relatively straight up black metal, how are you able to strike a balance making the songs a good mixture of black metal and experimental metal?

Well, that CD has been a sort a psychotic bursting. When I was in a precise mood, immediately I’m going to record the riffs and write lyrics, nothing was planned. Also to have learned to use the PC to record have permitted to go straight to the point. I’ve no problem to admit my influences and inspirations and sometimes I start to compose a song with the intentional aim to quote a band, but ,I suppose who the fact to have listened a lot of bands maybe have give me the input to go beyond these references.

How did the decision come about to be an experimental band instead of playing straight up and down black metal?

Absolutely no intentional decision. I play various instruments from a lot of time, I love to listen music every time is possible, and I try to put something of personal in every songs I wrote… I suppose it’s just the result of too many years of practice and rehearsing, the only intentional aim is to make intense songs. I can say who play black death metal is, for me, a real form of self expression.

Merdumgiriz put out some interesting releases to say the least. Were you always looking for someone with similar tastes to put the record out?

I’m interested in people connected not necessarily in their musical influences and listening but in the attitude towards the creative aspects of life, not just an hobby, but something of more deep. Playing extreme music is like to say a big “no” to the common life.

When creating this brand of music, were you looking for a specific sound?

Yes,but not just one. Depends also for the mood who I wanna express. I’m not interested to repeat the same formulas eternally, every style of music have his cliche­s but is also a work in progress. I see a musical style like a sort of entity with a sort of will and direction, and I must be submitted to him. Specifically about the ILWS debut that sound was the trying to shot, primarily, the usual listener of black death metal.

With sounding as unique as you do,and with black metal being a relatively stagnant genre, do you hope to breath some life into it with your particular style of black metal?

I think who Black Metal must be “re­founded”, or simply, to return to his roots, less commercial, less exposed to media and people. Black metal is too much vulgarized and sometimes people follow this style just for his aesthetic side . Too much posers in few words! It’s like some political parties, who have lost contact with his base and too many people use for their vanity. I can just to try to put my personal point of view and attitude into this scene, against any commercialism.

The debut is quite impressive and to me it was a challenge to explain what the music sounded like. Was that something that you were aiming for, for did the sound happen naturally?

That Cd was born really easily. At that time I’ve a lot of poison, hate & grudge to express, past musical experiences have surely aided me for the technical aspects, but I was really motivated and inspired at that time but at the same time some aspects weren’t planned for the musical aspects. I’ve let my inner demons to works freely.

Can you tell me a little bit about the writing and recording process?

At that time, R.A. “ Total Disgrace”, has the residence in a town really near to mine, so, we are in touch from several years, we’ve decided to start this project, lyrical aspects was developed from the compulsive reading of weird literature. I’ve written rhythm part on PC, recording has been between my house, house of R.A., another studio for the leads and the vocals, all things happened really easy, with a lot of fun. Creative activities are my vital lymph, daily life is goddammit boring.

How has the overall reaction been to your debut?

That Cd have more attention now then at the time of releasing. Some people have appreciated our raw attitude with a little of personality, other have criticized, especially for the drum machine use, but the most part of the ,so called, “scene” has just ignored, in Italy also nowadays we’re totally ignored with the exception of few individuals.

I have three standard questions. The first being: What is your most coveted band shirt?

I’ve a lot of shirts, too much I think, and all are proudly worn. Some times I choose some besides others, in consequence of my inner attitude but here we enter into subconscious. Maybe when I wear Blasphemy t-­shirts I’m more enraged against the world…to wear a t­shirt is an habit, for me, like the collar for a priest ahahah.

The second question is: When growing up what was your favorite record(s)?

Venom, Celtic Frost, Bathory, Destruction, Sodom, Kreator, Possessed, Necrovore, Morbid Angel, Death, Autopsy, Hellhammer. I can write an huge list here. Surely Venom and Bathory have open the gates of my personal hell, have hinted to me the form of self expression who I’ve had the necessity to use for my inner freedom.

The last question is: If you could work with any musician alive or deceased who would it be?

Quorthon for the passed away above all. For the alive people I’m just interested to connect with everyone who have my same bad feelings about existence and just wanna spew his grudge. Probably the next black death messiah are living among us without any sign of recognition of his talent. I just hope to find, in my area, really motivated and dedicated people to brainquake some feeble posers. Thank you for the interview and support!

Earlier today Jeff Alexis of Bloodstrike was kind enough to sit down with me and answer some burning questions I had for him about the new album In Death We Rot, as well as his favorite shirts and records. Check out the interview below and check out In Death We Rot.

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When first starting Bloodstrike, what vision did you have for the band?

The vision has always been to keep it straight forward, old school and heavy. Holly and I had thrown around the idea of starting a band years before but nothing ever materialized. When the opportunity finally came around we both knew that old school Swedish style death metal was what we wanted to do. It just fit us so well. We grew up on the stuff and her vocal style fits so well. We don’t want to reinvent the wheel, we just want to add our style to the genre.

That old school Swedish death style is kind of making a comeback and there are a lot of other new bands that play in that style. What separates Bloodstrike from the rest of the pack?

I think what separates Bloodstirke is that we’re solid as a unit. We’ve taken our time putting this band together and everyone contributes to our success. We’re all veterans and use that to build on Bloodstrike.

How did you end up getting in contact with Redefining Darkness? And was it a lengthy search for a label that would help put the record out?

Redefining Darkness called me one day asking if we’d be interested in working together. Thomas from the label and our bass player Rhia had known each other from the local Cleveland scene when she lived there. He had been keeping an eye on us for a little bit and liked what he saw. It wasn’t much of a lengthy search for us. We knew we were going to put this album out no matter if we had a deal or not. We did send out our demo to a few labels but nobody bit. We were pretty stoked when we got the call from Redefining Darkness Records.

How exciting has it been for you and Bloodstrike to be releasing this album, and to have a label like Redefining Darkness release this record?

Very exciting. We’re very proud of Bloodstrike and have worked hard over the past couple of years. It just makes us want to work harder. It’s killer to have someone in our corner like Redefining Darkness. Thomas “gets it” for sure. He’s a smart dude and a true metal head.

When writing for this album, was there a theme that you had in mind for it?

No, not necessarily a theme. Since this was our first full length we just wanted to make sure we had quality songs all the way around. Holly likes to write songs about serial killers, rapists, cancerous people and other fucked up shit in the world, so I guess that’s a theme of ours on this album.

Can you tell me a little bit about the writing and recording process?

Our practice space doubles as a recording studio so it was real nice to record our practices. I would make CDs for everyone to track the progression as we worked on the songs. The songs would start by one or two of us coming to practice with a few core riffs/ideas and we’d build from there. And the recording process was pretty smooth since we have our own place. No time restraints, and the comfort of our own place helped a lot. We did go into the recording with all the songs complete. We were really tight as band with the songs before we even started recording. We had our friend Patrick Bruss of Crypticus do the mix and Thomas from the label had his guy Ken Sorceron master it for us.

What are some of the obstacles and challenges that you guys faced during the writing and recording process?

The biggest challenge for me was to turn over the mix to someone else. Lol. I’m a producer as well but realized that having someone else mix and master was the right thing to do. I wanted to have an outside ear to bounce things off of, but also have their input on the mix. It was a challenge for me to get that balance. The writing process was very smooth. Again, we didn’t have any time restraints. We took our time when we wrote the songs. Practiced them and listened until we were satisfied.

Who have been some of your inspirations to want to create this type of music?

I’ll start with the obvious ones. Grave is a huge influence. Entombed, Dismember, Unleashed. Venom, Black Sabbath and SLAYER as well. The not so obvious are all the shitty bands out there today. Over playing their parts or just playing breakdowns the entire song. These bands have inspired me to stay true to my metal roots. Also newer bands like Black Breath and Entrails have been an influence to keep the torch burning.

So I have just three more questions for you, three standard questions that I like to ask. The first being, which band shirt(s) is your most coveted?

My Triptycon shirt from seeing them a few years ago. Tom G is the man. The other would have to be my Grave shirt, I’ve only seen them once so that shirt is hung up in the closet.

My second question is, when growing up what were some of your favorite records?

I’m old school so for me it was Kiss Alive, SLAYER Show no Mercy, Black Sabbath Heaven and Hell and Iron Maiden The Number of the Beast.

If someone ever was able to put that together for a tour, I’d travel with it haha. My last question is, if you were able to work with anyone alive and deceased who would it be?

Alive it would be Toni Iommi because he is heavy metal and deceased would be Randy Rhoads. The way he combined heavy metal and classical guitar was amazing.

Dude, thank you for the interview. We really appreciate it.

Of course, and thank you for sitting down and taking the time to answer my questions, I really appreciate it.

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Bloodstrike and their album In Death We Rot will be out through Redefining Darkness Records on the 25th of this month.